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With the exception of the Tungsten C, all palmOne handhelds lack an important ingredient: Wi-Fi. Without 802.11b wireless networking these devices can't use public hot spots or private access points to retrieve e-mail and surf the Web, limiting their appeal for many.

That situation is about to change. Though it has been slow in coming, palmOne today introduced its first solution—a Secure Digital (SD) card—to bring Wi-Fi to two of its PDAs: the Bluetooth-enabled Tungsten T3 and Zire 72. (Bluetooth is a short-range, low-throughput "personal area network" wireless technology.)

With palmOne's new Wi-Fi SD card, Zire 72 and Tungsten T3 owners can now link to any public or private wireless network from a range of 100-300 feet to an access point.

palmOne's General Manger of Accessories, Jim Schwabe, said "With the expansion of hotspots and Wi-Fi networks in homes and in businesses, we felt it was important to offer our mobile handheld users another compelling Wi-Fi solution."

Unfortunately for owners of earlier Palm models, they won't be able to use the company's new Wi-Fi SD card, as palmOne won't make drivers available for the Tungsten E, Tungsten T, Tungsten T2 or the Treo 600 smartphone. It is likely the power drain from the Wi-Fi SD card is too large for these devices to handle.

On a side note, a couple of months back, SanDisk announced it would start selling a Wi-Fi SD card for palmOne's Zire 71, the precursor to the Zire 72. At the time of the announcement, SandDisk said the SD card required a software patch to be compatible with the Tungsten T3 and Zire 72, but it couldn't offer the patch itself—the patch had to come from palmOne. The handheld company, however, didn't seem to be any hurry to create one. Now we know why.

palmOne's SD Wi-Fi card should be available on September 3rd for $129.